The Perfect 100

Hello everybody and welcome back to the BNI Perfect 100 podcast.

I have an amazing guest for you today.

His name is Ronnie Smith.

Ronnie, tell us who you are.

give us a little background of what you're up to.

Okay, I am a mortgage lender with Orion Financial.

been doing mortgage loans for 13 years in Jackson, Tennessee area and here in the Memphis
area now.

Just joined East Memphis BNI about a year ago, hold the obviously residential mortgage
seat in the chapter.

you've been a member for a year.

To give transparency, we're in the same chapter, so I have a little bit more inside
information on Ronnie than I might have with other folks.

All right, Ronnie, so you're going to have you give me your best 60 seconds.

I'm going to put, I've got a minute on the clock.

So go ahead and give us the one you would share in your meeting.

Ready?

Go.

I'm Ronnie Smith with Orion Financial.

I hold the residential mortgage seat here in the East Memphis chapter.

Why choose me?

That's the question.

Here's why.

Number one, I'm local.

I live in this community.

I care about this community.

I have a reputation to uphold in this community and I can be held accountable here in this
community.

You couple that with number two, we save you time and money.

At the largest credit union in Memphis, we have super competitive rates and charge no
lender fees.

Our whole team communicates well, not only with one another, but with our clients.

You'll always know where you are in the mortgage process because we all keep you updated
from start to finish.

We make sure the process is running smoothly and efficiently along the way.

No delayed closings or last minute requests

Orion will save you time and money.

And finally, I'm reliable.

If I give you a pre-approval letter to purchase a home with a green light to refinance,
you'll never have to hear me say, I'm sorry I missed that or I didn't know or.

I I could have caught that earlier.

I do my comprehensive work on the front end and provide you with a letter that actually
means something.

stand behind my work every single time.

Ronnie Smith, Orion Financial.

Awesome.

Well, and for those that don't know, because I actually was in a chapter where they didn't
know this existed.

So there is a BNI timer app that you can set for the various things like the featured
presentation and however long your chapter does for the weekly commercials.

So you can find that in the app store.

All right.

So what strategies have you found have helped you to keep engaged in BNI for yourself so
far?

Strategies?

ah Really pushing in.

uh In one-on-ones, for me, it's most important to know the people.

If you ever, I don't think I've been called on in one meeting to to ask, what is your
favorite category?

And relationships is always the thing for me.

And so to get to know the people as deeply as I can, not just on a business level, but you
know.

uh

about their personal lives, what they like to do, because I'm going to want to refer
business.

I want to treat this like family and friends.

And so my strategy has been to know people well as best I can and to understand their
business at the same time.

um But that strategy in particular, ah and just being real, just being myself so they know
who I am as well, sometimes you can just, you don't know if you're really talking to the

person in front of you.

Sometimes it's like, is this just your business approach?

like yourselves pitch, but try to be authentic and try to seek the authentic in them.

Yeah.

you, especially because based on, again, we're going to talk about this in a minute, but
based on your strengths, that's a huge trigger for you is to get to know the people.

um So we'll talk more about that.

So we're going to jump over to, because this is the perfect 100, we're going to jump over
to that report.

So for those of you listening, I will read the report that Ronnie has.

across the board.

So on the power of one, the perfect score is 100.

That means you're utilizing the framework to do all the things that BNI says will help us
all be more successful within BNI.

So if we go from left to right, Ronnie has 23 weeks on the report that is up on the screen
and his score is 45.

He is in the red and he recognizes there's, he and I talked off screen or off audio about

where he's at and one of the reasons why he wanted to be on the podcast was to kind of
move things in a different direction.

So we're going to talk about that a little bit more as well.

But the good news is his attendance is 98%.

He is in the green with 20.

And of the 23 weeks he has been, I also can see his palms report for those of you that
can't see it.

He's been present, it's all except for one where he had a sub.

So, and that's why.

He's at 98 % attendance, even though he's really at 100.

When you have a sub, you don't get the full points, but you're still 20 points in the
green.

So that's all that matters.

Now your referrals per week, it is gray with five.

um Your visitors per week are gray with five.

Your one-to-ones per week,

is .91, which is yellow, which is 15 points, and your CEUs per week, wah, wah, at zero.

Which you talked about a minute ago, right?

That's not your thing.

So as we, let's look at the Palms Report, which is the next slide.

There we go.

So if you look across, I wanted to call out a few things.

um Well first of all, what's your impression about your Power One?

know, because you and I have talked about it not on here, but tell the listeners what you
think.

a month ago I was in the yellow and I knew what I needed to do.

oh But you and I have talked and there was a kind of a crisis moment for me in deciding
like, what is this going to look like for me moving forward and am I going to continue to

participate in?

And just in the past week, I think it's all come clear to me.

What I see in front of me, do I like it?

By all means, no.

um Do I know what I need to do?

Yes.

Some of the things, they're still gonna be semi-challenged, being fairly newer to the
Memphis market.

um Not knowing a ton of people, but I learned this past week, and we'll talk about this,
I'm sure, and when we get to the CliftonStrengths thing.

I think I have identified even within the past week, my way forward and my way to get out
of the red and into green eventually.

That's the goal.

Yes, well, and thank you for being, I guess, vulnerable is the right word to share.

that there's, this report is never, you're a bad person because you're, know, gray, red,
whatever.

uh All it is really is a measurement of the success that you're having utilizing the
framework that is been kind of proven for 40 years that will work for you.

If you do all the things, eventually you will get the business that you're looking for.

And it's gonna be unique and different for everyone based on what they do and who they
are.

And that's why I kind of wanted to marry the CliftonStrengths with your BNI experience
because how you work BNI is unique to you.

And we're gonna talk about that in a minute.

uh I did wanna look at the Palms Report, which is if you're seeing this on screen, you can
see that Ronnie's Palms Report, but I will read it for the rest.

um He...

Referrals given inside is two, and this is a series of from, if you pull up your personal
Palms report, anybody can do this.

You can pull up your own anytime you like, and it automatically defaults to six months
worth because that is what the power of one is also.

It is also six months of time.

So if you're trying to steer a ship away from a iceberg, it gives you a uh kind of a
history of what you've seen.

And also it can record sometimes things aren't getting captured.

potentially your vice president didn't process a report or whatever, but if you've missed
something, this is the first place you look.

Because if you're saying, I've been giving referrals or receiving referrals and they're
not showing, you can go back and see which week.

So you can kind of keep track of things.

But referrals given inside to referrals given outside six.

do you have a partner in a different chapter that you're doing some business with?

Is that what that is?

Or sometimes the app?

defaults to the wrong thing and you just don't switch it over.

Is that what that is?

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

So that's eight total referrals given inside the chapter then.

And then referrals received inside, for those of you that can't see my hand, there's a
zero, it's a goose egg, which is concerning, right?

Is if you are at one year mark, because Ronnie's about to, coming up on a year here
shortly, looking at that going, do I

what do I wanna do here, right?

Does this make sense for me?

And I am, I've been in BNI for 10 years, or more than 10 years, and I think it makes sense
for everybody when done in a way that makes sense for them.

So we'll talk more about that, because it's obviously not something anybody wants to see
is zero referrals um received.

that's, well it says received inside, but it says you've received referrals from the
outside.

So has somebody sent you referrals?

There have been a few, um not as many as I've referred, think, but all inside.

I've not gotten anything from outside.

So something's happening with

the way that's reporting.

outside should be coming from a different chapter.

you know, when you get off this podcast, we can go and look in your app and see if maybe
there's some things you didn't see.

Because sometimes people, I will find, and this is a best practice alert, I will find
somebody, sometimes somebody will send me a referral and it only, they only send it

through the system.

So you get the, if you're lucky, you see the pop up on your phone, say somebody sent you a
referral.

and you go and you look at it.

But if you missed it, then sometimes you don't go and look at your app and you don't even
realize that there was a referral sent to you.

And I know that has happened to other people.

So best practice for me is if I'm gonna send somebody a referral and they're in my phone,
I will send them a text.

If they're not in my phone, I will send them an email and say, hey, I just sent you this
person and here's why.

um And as much information as I can give because...

A warm referral is only a warm referral if you know some information.

It's kind of hard to call somebody up when you don't know anything other than here's their
info, which is not much better than a cold referral.

if we can warm up the seat for our fellow BNI members, that's awesome.

And that will help with that.

All right, so visitors is one.

um One to ones is 23 out of 23 weeks.

So good job.

You're supposed to do one week, you got that.

And then thank you for closed business.

On the Pulse report, that's what you've given.

So $1,825 is what you've given.

And if you've had zero referrals, I'm guessing what you've received is also zero.

uh So not a good thing.

And then CEUs is zero.

So if you had a strategy, looking at this, because you and I spoke, but that doesn't mean
our listeners have heard anything.

So kind of thinking about what you want to

do to make things change a little bit.

What is your, give me just one thing that you think you're gonna change for a strategy.

uh Well, I'm going to carve out time, just a daily time for CEU.

I've got to do that.

And I can make that happen.

It's really just being a little bit more organized with my time.

That's one thing.

I will give you another thing.

want to go ahead and just what I've realized over the past week is making sure I'm out of
the office at networking events, chamber events, whatever, because just in the past week,

I've been to two things that have given me opportunities.

that are going to lead to people being invited to be in our meetings.

so, uh but I don't know for whatever reason, just avoided going to these things and seeing
the importance of it.

So there's two things for you that.

and it's a perfect lead into our next slide, which is going to be Ronnie's top five
Clifton strengths.

So for those that can't see again, I'm going to read them for you.

So Ronnie's top strength is woo.

And woo, for those that are uneducated to Clifton strengths, is not that woo woo, you
know, you're a woo woo person.

It is winning others over.

So it says, you love the challenge of meeting new people and winning them over, which is
ironic because you just said

in the last sentence that you weren't going to outside events.

And that's a thing that, based on all of your, which we're gonna get all of them here in a
second, but that should be a good thing for you, right?

Is you enjoy meeting new people and breaking the ice, making new connections.

So uh we in our chapter, again, I have a little kind of more insight because we're on the
same chapter, but we started a, uh we divided the chapter into four things and asked

people to pick, when I say four things, uh

and I actually don't have them right in front of me, but I'm trying to remember what they
are.

Retention, hospitality, um I can't remember the other two, but hospitality was the one
that Ronnie got put on.

um Everybody just chose the area that they wanted to focus on helping the chapter grow
through, and hospitality, perfect for Ronnie based on his top five skill sets, top five

talents rather.

So making new connections.

right, then the second one is communication.

em So you generally find it easy to put your thoughts into words and you're a good
conversationalist and presenter and I have seen and heard you do both and I agree.

Alright, next one.

So number three is positivity.

So you have contagious enthusiasm.

You're upbeat and can get others excited about what they are going to do.

Number four is connectedness.

You have faith in the links among all things.

You believe there are a few coincidences and that almost every event has meaning.

So you don't think things just happen, they happen because they're supposed to.

We were all meant to be probably in the same BNI chapter for a reason.

you value that group of people being there together, hopefully to support you.

And then the last is number five is developer.

You recognize and cultivate the potential in others.

You spot the signs.

of each small improvement and derive satisfaction from evidence of progress.

So I want to ask you after you got your report, your assessment results, I know when
before you took it, you said to me, I'm not even sure what my strengths are.

So were you surprised when you got your assessment back with the results?

uh

I showed my wife, I read it to her she was laughing.

uh

because it was so true to life.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, you know, the report goes a little more in depth with some of those things that you
just read off that kind of the one sentence summary, but there's one phrase under the woo

woo.

They see no strangers, only friends they haven't met yet.

That's me.

That's me to a court.

So to my court.

But yeah, I was all of them.

I mean, if some of the ones toward the bottom, there are different ways that.

that I develop and connect, even outside of BNI that I see myself doing all the time.

Love to connect people with the right things.

A friend of mine, I'll tell you this story, a friend of mine's business who visited our
chapter.

His business has been struggling.

He's looking for opportunities and my radar's on full alert and I called him last night.

I got three things, three people I've talked to that I think you need to, and so I'm just
thinking of how I can connect him to the right folks.

And so that's kind of how I'm wired when I can meet the people, which is important.

You go and meet.

So I like to do what I do.

yes, yes.

So you, your themes are, so the colors next to the talents that you have are, you have
three relationship building and two influencing.

and you may have, these are only the top five, so when you do your full 34, there's
probably a whole bunch more supporting characters behind that, but these are the ones you

tend to be in the most.

And so,

relationship building and influencing are your two things and you live in that world.

So it's interesting to me that it's perfect for BNI.

mean, can't imagine a different, know, this everything you possess is perfect for what we
do at BNI.

But how you use it is the thing.

So what one thing after you read your report,

did you feel like I really want to and I thought it was funny also you said I have a story
for you and m which is what people with your talents do they tell stories that's how they

connect with people is through stories and so in communication you you enjoy a good story
to share which is great for BNI because everybody how when we do our weekly commercial

however long it is a story

lands for people because a story is easier to remember.

I can't tell you how many times somebody's told me of a circumstance that they solved, a
story they fixed in their business.

And when I meet somebody who I think would be a good referral for them, I tell that story,
right?

Because stories are easy to remember and that, you know, sort of the character and the
struggle being solved by

person is what we all unanimously share.

We're in business to solve some sort of problem generally um or make things better and so
when when those things happen that that story is what is in our brain that we remember so

that's awesome.

So you're gonna lean into tell me again what are you leaning into as you move forward now
that you know your strengths or did I ask you that question I can't remember now.

ah Well, we've probably danced around it a good bit if not hit right on it, but using my
personality and going and just meeting new people ah because and learning their stories

and and making friends and then connecting them to my group and wherever I need to connect
them.

My friends outside of this group, know, so it's uh yeah, I think that's that's what I.

This just confirmed the CliftonStrengths, I think, was like a siren going off.

ah Here you go, you know yourself and you're dumb enough to forget it, apparently, but
just go do what you do and go be who you are.

Yeah, well, and you know, the interesting thing for me always whenever I get people's
assessments back is the first person we forget, or not forget, but the first opportunity

we have is to, when we receive what our strengths are, it's kind of outward.

It's like, are we doing with other people?

We sometimes forget to look at ourselves and apply our own strengths to our own self.

and you have developers, so em you understand em how to take people that are not getting
what they need and help them get more of it, and you enjoy cultivating that thing.

you can apply that to yourself, is what are you, if you look kind of take a step back from
what the reports say and look at your...

how you're doing things either in your BNI chapters, what we're here talking about it, but
it also applies to what you do for work.

uh Are you developing, look at yourself, if this was someone else that you were trying to
help, because I know you like to help people.

So how would you help yourself first?

They always, and I think I said this on the last podcast is when you're on an airplane,
the first thing they do is tell you to put the mask on yourself.

and then help your neighbor.

uh So as you're thinking about those things is how can you take all the things you're
great at and you know that positivity sometimes you're can is it hard for you to maintain

that positivity all the time?

Is it hard?

Yeah, mean, especially, mean, like with just the way BNI has gone for me so far, the way
my work has gone over the last three years in a down mortgage market.

Sometimes it is hard to maintain positivity, but I'm generally an optimist.

And so it um comes more naturally for me to be positive even in the hard circumstances.

Yeah, with your, way and the top five that you have kind of intermingle with each other,
you really have a gift to see potential and then you have a gift to communicate.

So, you know, can you aim those things at the people that are your team in your chapter?

And, you know, and the cool thing about knowing what your strengths are is, you I, looking
at mine, you possess, you and I are kind of on opposite ends of things.

So sometimes it's good to pair with somebody who is strong in other areas to help make you
better and the same goes for me as I'm I was looking at yours I'm in the 20s on most of

the things that you're strong at In the full 34 um in fact Developers my number 30 which
is ironic and it doesn't mean I'm not good at developing It just means I don't go about it

the same way you do

uh I'm a maximizer, so development is in my top five, but it reads a different way.

I like to take good things that make them great.

You like to take underperforming things across the board and work with everyone.

And actually, uh there's a blind spot with developers sometimes is if you think about
potentially someone in the chapter, let's say you're on the membership committee.

And maybe you want to give people chances that maybe they shouldn't have because that's
how you are.

You might say, can save them.

And sometimes they can't be saved, right?

And that's the difference between, know, Maximizer developer, Maximizer is just going to
move on to the next thing.

em So sometimes it's good to have that well-rounded view and pair with people.

And that also goes for inside the chapter for just building your teams, As you can,
sometimes the person you're in your chapter you think is least likely to give you a

referral is just somebody that's just waiting to give you your bus referral.

You just haven't had that conversation yet.

So sometimes you have to think about it like that.

All right, so when you think about...

the overall chapter, how do you personally, because now you know these things, how do you
feel like you personally contribute to the growth, the energy, the success?

How will I or how am I currently?

either are or will, it's fine.

Um, yeah, I would like to say how I will.

Um, I mean, generally speaking, I feel a, a, a, a part of the chapter.

I don't feel like a big producing part.

And obviously you can see that on paper, um, or in a report, but, I know what my potential
is and I know, um, that I'm capable of, of contributing more.

And I think my part will be.

using my strengths like we've, mean, you we're going to keep beating the dead horse here,
but em getting out more and being in front of people outside of our chapter at different

things, which is going to benefit my chapter, hopefully our chapter, uh and getting guests
and just maybe, you know, adding to our chapter.

We'll see.

uh But I just, know that's where it is, is, and then maybe once we get them in the chapter
using the gifts of development, if folks are struggling.

like myself and I'll be able to speak from experience to say, can do this.

uh I was here at this point and in the red and probably having conversations with people
about my future in BNI and just have to make a decision, but being able to encourage

people to say it's, you can climb out of the hole and if you want to.

uh

Yes, yes, that's amazing.

Yeah, think it's because storytelling is your strong suit.

And I think that having been there, done that for a lot of people is the best story,
right?

If I'm not, if I, you know, there's that struggle that we all have at some point when you
can pull yourself out of that struggle and with the help and that's what we do, you know,

in BNI, I feel like that relationship building, is, you know, your relationship building
is one of your key strengths.

You've got three that are up on the screen for those that can't see it.

That's your main thing is relationship building and influencing.

So helping people are the main things.

You don't have any in your top five.

I would venture to say if we did unlock the rest, there would definitely be some executing
and strategic thinking, but your go-to is people.

So really for you, I don't think you necessarily need to do more.

You just need to be more of you.

And you need to be more intentional, right?

It's just having intention behind

applying what you already do well to the thing that you've decided will work if we do it.

Something along those lines, right?

So if you were to give advice to somebody new, and maybe we've kind of covered it, we'll
see, but if you were gonna give advice to somebody just joining a chapter or maybe

somebody struggling, what advice would you give them to work towards the perfect 100?

Well, if you're buying in in the beginning, just to start with the mindset of go all in um
and you're investing in this, so you're not going to get any return unless you invest

fully.

So myself, and there are varying reasons.

I'm not going to get into all the details of my life right now and why it's been a
struggle to do certain things and not do certain things.

But um

giving your all and I can honestly say BNI has not gotten my all up to this point.

Now I've got to push myself toward that.

So it's easy to kind of pick one thing and say well I can do this and not the others but
I'm realizing the importance of all the things and so going all in on all the things as

best you can is going to benefit everyone not just yourself but the entire group.

Yeah, in the Rising Tide, Let's All Ships uh kind of situation is, we all go through those
seasons where some life happens, there's things.

So you can't always give all the things all the time, but when you can, and if you can't,
that's where having an amazing chapter to fall back on can help.

If you can share, and you don't have to share, but it's just helpful when you have a group
that you trust, know, like and trust.

uh that we can share these things with each other and we can help and when things are in a
downturn, we can help support each other.

So that's amazing.

um

and if I may add, you know, knowing, I don't know, and this relates in a lot of different
areas of life, but kind of the whole idea of teamwork.

um I love it here at my office.

I'm starting to see the benefit of having my whole team, not just myself, focused in on
the loans, but I've watched this team perform and act like no team that I've been a part

of before.

They're taking on things and tasks and helping with things that I'm not used to.

them helping with, which makes my job a little bit easier.

But when you see a teammate, let's just, let's give an example, say a basketball team and
you're out there, all of you, you think playing as hard as you can, but then you realize

one of my players is not giving full effort.

There's going to be some frustration on the court.

It's going to lead to contention within the team itself.

And it's going to lead to lack of, you know, optimal performance with that team too.

And the same goes to, for B and I.

uh I just was sitting there thinking last week, like, you're affecting this team and the
way it performs to some degree.

ah And so I want to carry that weight and understand that responsibility of if these are
my true friends and people that I want to spend years doing business with and building

friendships with, what does it say to them when I don't care to do the things I'm supposed
to do?

And so that uh you want to be an authentic friend who

shows their authenticity or their true friendship by being a true friend and participating
with the team like you've committed to do.

Yeah, I love that.

it's funny you said that because I just had a conversation with somebody about
CliftonStrengths about that is that same team that you're talking about is if people, if

we're asking the, and I don't know positions in basketball very well, but let me switch to
baseball because I know baseball well.

If I'm asking the center fielder to be the pitcher and pitch a good game, that, am I going
to get the best out of that person?

Probably not, right?

Ronnie Shaken says no.

So, you know, but if I ask the pitcher to, you know, pitch and they're, you know, and I
support them in they're a really good pitcher and I help them do some pitching, throwing

all the things that make them stronger, they're going to be better.

And so are we as a whole, right?

So sometimes we're just not operating in our strengths.

And when we don't know what they are, that's hard to do, you know?

So I think the first step.

I know weird, right?

recognize.

I think we have a coach in our group who helps determine strengths.

Yes.

Yeah.

I mean, cause you can feel lost if you're not doing, if you're trying to do things that
aren't, in your wheelhouse, so to speak, but other people can help support you do them.

Um, you know, there there's all kinds of solutions that, you know, I have high ideation.

I've already thought of like three or four things to get your CEUs up that don't involve
you listening to a podcast.

Although we are on a podcast, so please do listen to this podcast and all the others.

Because you are going to get a CEU for listening to this one.

Yeah, and let me just give a plug for you in the moment because this test.

So I've taken personality tests over the years and I can't even name them all.

They're even ones within churches.

You know, they're these spiritual gift tests and it just seems like over the years.

I don't know if I didn't answer the questions.

They can be confusing sometimes and but I never had anything that just kind of jumped off
the charts and was obvious.

It was like I had a bunch of six.

on a scale of zero to 10, like I was six in like most of the categories and nothing was
strong.

And this CliftonStrengths thing, for whatever reason, I do feel like this is the first
time that I've ever taken one of these tests, personality, strengths, whatever you wanna

call it, this is a strength test, and feel like I'm walking away with something valuable.

So I wanna thank you for that.

And you're welcome.

Yeah, it's for me, it's been life changing because I've done I did the top five and if you
may have heard me say these things before, but I did the top five in 2009 the first time

and then again in 20, I think it was 2015 and then I get it later.

I did the full 34 and hired a coach and that made a big difference because knowing it is
one thing, but applying it as another.

So.

Having the knowledge is great, but knowing how to use it is another.

So thank you for that.

So what was most useful from our conversation today for you, Ronnie?

putting my power of one in my palms report all of that up there just to remind me ah where
I am because there's nowhere to go but up.

That's the good thing.

Sometimes the best place to be in.

can't really go much lower.

I could go lower.

Well, I'll look forward to checking in with you later, but I appreciate you being here and
I appreciate everybody that's listening today.

So keep on building what makes you you and we'll see you next time.